It's been a pretty good day today. Alex was not at his best early this morning and I feared we were taking backward steps. Not so, thankfully, as he ate a HUGE amount of food today and was bouncy and barking and pretty much his normal self after getting over his early morning grumpies.  Yeah, Alex! The back side of this is that he goes back in two days for yet another chemo treatment. Hopefully this next one won't affect him as much. Fingers crossed.

We had a lap fest in the pool again tonight. The water temp is at 86 freakin' degrees. It's like a hot tub. I did 30 lengths and could have done more, but I stopped while I was ahead of my game. The water is luscious. Warm. Inviting. Only one bat tonight. It seems the bug population is not to their liking. We still have a few fireflies on and off (more off than on) and the cicadas have not yet really arrived.

We are in the midst of a heat wave here. The heat indices have been over 100 degrees F for the past couple of days. Tomorrow is supposed to be our hottest yet. It seems silly to say, but it can be too hot to be outside in the pool. I hide in the air conditioning with the dogs. I don't think we've had the house open for about a month now. We really need two zones for our house to keep it cool upstairs which we don't have, so we have a room air conditioner in our bedroom that runs constantly at night. During the day of course, we keep all necessary rooms closed off. I try to get everything done that I need to do such as watering outside plants, errands to the store, etc., done before the afternoon heat sets in. It's supposed to end this weekend with a round of (naturally) severe storms. We need a break.

But for now we'll enjoy the crazy pool temps and lap it all up.

I did a little research on my orange buddy this morning and found out that he is in fact not a lizard but a Red Eft, or also called a Red-Spotted Newt. Their life story is pretty interesting. I found this short description on a blog of someone in Pennsylvania.

"A Red Eft is the young woodland form of the Green Newt, a type of salamander. After the eggs hatch, the babies leave the water for several years to roam the moist woods. They eventually return to the water to mature and spend the rest of their lives. The adults are green with bright yellow bellies and tails like tadpoles. You often see them in aquarium shops. The Efts are harmless, gentle beasts, about two inches long, and are quite startling with their brilliant coloration. After a heavy rainfall you sometimes see hundreds of them emerging from under the leaves and moss."

Here is a link to learn more about these fascinating little creatures. I have no idea where he came from. We do have a small stream that runs through our property, so maybe he crawled up from there. I'm glad I went out to feed the birds yesterday morning at that particular time or I might never have seen one. I'm also grateful that he stayed put long enough for me to run inside and get the camera.